As a long time enthusiast of the IARU contest, I agree with Steve about the
unfortunate flaws in the IARU; The "explosion" of HQ multipliers has skewed
the original rules and made it Euro-centric as well as adding some positive
and negative characteristics of "uber-participation" by national societies.
But the fact that both CW and SSB are included, with "work everyone" rules
and a 24 hours duration is terrific. And amazingly, the IARU starts in the
morning in the USA. All are terrific plusses. The IARU is a test of
understanding summer propagation (in the Northern Hemisphere), a different
breed of cat from winter contests. The matter of alleged European ethics
(or lack of same) in some circles is a matter for the European community in
my opinion. In the US right now, it appears to me that self-policing
pressures within the contest community are effective in preventing similar
excesses.
I can see no positive outcomes from a boycott of the IARU contest. It's
counter-productive to make one of the best contests less participative. On
the other hand, a constructive dialogue regarding excesses is important.
Most corrective actions begin at the ground floor, where the people most
affected and involved put pressure on wrong doers. There are certain
technical developments, like thorough log-checking and a robust UBN system,
and self-spotting abuse checks, that are coming into universal usage, and
these are good for sure. At the end of the day, the contesting community is
responsible for the ethics and the long term health of the sport. Along
these lines, kudos to K3LR and the Contest University community for their
pro-contest efforts, and others including the NCCC's Thursday night NS series.
One suggestion; the IARU organizers might consider some way to increase the
importance of the original ITU Zones as multipliers compared with the large
number of member society HQ multipliers. One way to re-emphasize the
original concept would be to make an ITU Zone Mult equal to two or even
three HQ Mults. That would be an adjustment which could be made without
major surgery to the overall concept.
I'll be in there competing in the IARU for sure.
Jim George N3BB
At 10:16 AM 6/16/2007 -0400, Steve London wrote:
>There's nothing wrong with the fundamental concepts behind the IARU HF World
>Championship - 24 hours, both non-digital modes, points for working everyone,
>zone multipliers per band. However, it's what you call "semi-political stuff"
>that makes the current IARU contest so bad for the image of all
>contesters. It's
>hard enough convincing non-contesters and fledging contesters that cheating
>isn't rampant in contesting, without having a contest, with such a grandioso
>name, where cheating is at best ignored, and at worst condoned.
>
>Bob, as an important player on the CQWW Contest Committee, you and the
>committee
>would never tolerate any kind of cheating in CQWW, so how can you personally
>ignore it in another major contest ?
>
>By the way, there's another contest will all the positive attributes of IARU,
>but without the cheating - the Russian DX Contest. Unfortunately, this
>contest
>just hasn't caught on outside of Russia and Europe.
>
>73,
>Steve, N2IC
>
>
>Robert Naumann wrote:
> > Steve,
> >
> > I agree with your summary of the issues surrounding the IARU test, but
> aside
> > from the top level competitors, and those "in the know", most of the
> > participants don't care about that "semi-political" stuff.
> >
> > Just getting on the air and operating is actually enough for many (probably
> > most) contest participants.
> >
> > I think that if you ignore the BS that is going on in certain areas of that
> > contest, it is an attractive contest to get new people involved in.
> >
> > One, is that you can work anyone. So, good conditions are not necessarily a
> > pre-req to making qsos.
> >
> > Two, is that it is only 24 hours. Not too much of a commitment for anyone -
> > especially if you have a team of operators.
> >
> > Three, is that you can work both modes. That is a unique thing that could
> > attract fans of code or fone.
> >
> > Just trying to be positive :-)
> >
> > 73,
> >
> > Bob W5OV
> >
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